In the Depths of the Ministry
by RainyDaysAndGoodBooks
Summary: Voldemort wins AU. Draco doesn't know if he ever expected to see Potter again, but it certainly wasn't here, in a dusty old corridor at the Ministry. Everyone has a choice to make at some point; it's time for Draco to make his.


**Optional Prompts: (word) allegiance, (word) lace, (word) cruel**

 **Thank you to my beta: QueenBookwormTheFirst!**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**

The velvet robe is warm against his skin, but Draco can't stop shivering. The cries of newly discovered mudbloods ring through his head, and he can't get the mangled bodies of those that disobeyed the Dark Lord out of his head. _Stop_ , he thinks, _stop_! He clutches his head in his hands. _You are a twenty year old man. Get. Ahold. Of. Yourself._

He is interrupted by a hoarse voice. "Why Draco, what is the matter? I would hate for you to miss the trials today."

Draco smells the scent of raw flesh and shudders. He doesn't have to turn around to know who it is. "Just a headache, Fenrir," he replies.

The werewolf has long since stopped wearing the mangy old clothes he used to, but his hair is still matted and and tangled and his teeth—Draco stifles the bile rising in his throat.

"Good," Fenrir says. "I would hate to find out it was something worse." Draco bites his tongue to refrain from speaking and discovers—with horror—that he is shaking ever so slightly. He nods stiffly, and Fenrir departs, walking jauntily along the obsidian tiles of the long black corridor.

For a moment Draco closes his eyes at the utter obliviousness of the Dark Lord's followers. How could Fenrir not know? Did he not read the signs, stapled on Lord Voldemort's disgust at the thought of half-breeds walking, living, breathing around him and pinned to the ministry's new laws?

Yet, he walks on obliviously, unable to comprehend that this will not be a trial for mudbloods, but for half breeds, and that it will be his blood on the floor this time, not his victims. _Everything in this reign_ , Draco thinks for the 230th time, _is far too cruel._

But then the sharp clicks of a pair of high heels begins to echo around the corridor and anxious not to meet another Death Eater, he leaves.

He is supposed to report to the Departure of Transportation, which tracks everyone and alerts the higher class of any 'illegals,' but he has a boring job in a boring department, and nobody really cares when he shows up—he is a Malfoy after all—so he plots his path carefully, choosing only the most neglected and cobwebbed corridors in the hopes that nobody will be close enough to talk to him.

He turns the corner slowly, treading as softly as he can with the slick silver soles of his shoes. And then, he sees a hand. It is pale and disembodied and floats eerily above the corridor. Draco stifles a scream, but before he can sprint down the corridor or indeed even move a single toe, the hand grows into an arm, and then a chest and then a person.

The person is rather skinny, but not quite gaunt, and they look oddly familiar. Unaware they have been spotted, they creep cautiously across the tiles. But then, as a torch falls over their raven locks, Draco withholds a gasp. How could he have not recognized Harry Potter? And what in the name of Merlin is Potter doing here?

At that moment however, for whatever reason, Potter turns to look at him. He is wearing a thick wool sweater the color of fresh butterbeer, but somehow, he still manages to look as cold as Draco feels. "Malfoy!" he whispers. His voice is fearful and angry and daring all at once.

Draco can only stand there. He feels as though he is being swept away on a tidal wave, pulled, and pushed, and churned through the water. Somehow though, he can not identify how he's feeling, but he knows—he's not sure how—that it is not fear. Draco has felt enough fear over the past few years; indeed, the sensation of a cold hand crawling up his back, quick shortened breaths, and the special kind of terror that resides in his stomach are symptoms he feels so regularly that he feels almost hollow without them, like a Russian doll that has lost its counterparts.

"What are you doing here, Potter?" Miraculously, Draco's voice is as smooth as tiles beneath their feet, and that regal tone from so long ago—Hogwarts feels like a distant dream now—has emerged.

Something in Potter seems to change, as though he'd hoped Draco would still be the frightened puppy he knew in his last year of schooling, and in one fluid motion, he whips out his wand and points it directly at Draco's heart.

Draco has already pulled out his own wand, inlaid with silver and emeralds, and he holds it gently, but perfectly poised, at Potter's forehead. "What. Do. You. Want. Potter," he snarls and suddenly everything feels right in the world. He feels the Hogwarts cobblestones beneath his feet and sunshine of the grounds on his neck. He feels the warmth of his best friend Crabbe behind him and the utter normality of the pale skin on his unmarked left arm.

But Potter does not make some snarky remark, he only sighs and looks colder than ever, and the illusion is broken. Somehow Draco feels even more desolate than before.

And then, Potter draws back his wand and shouts, "Petrificus Totalis."

Draco is ready once again, and he cries, "Protego!" just in time. The spell bounces off and shatters the torch above Potter, sending the pieces flying. Like sharp-edged confetti, the bits of broken glass shower down on them, and Draco feels his lip bleeding. It is warm and throbbing, but he resists the urge to touch it.

There is a long scratch on Potter's cheek and another on his shoulder, but he ignores them and finally, finally opens his mouth to tell Draco what he needs to hear, "I'm here to get . . . something that might help us defeat Voldemort."

For a second, Potter seems to be thinking so hard that Draco can almost see the gears turning in his head. Then he studies Draco as though he is a particularly fascinating insect, perched on the slide of a microscope. "We would all appreciate your assistance," he says, levelheaded and formal, as though he and Draco are business partners about to sign a contract. So Potter thinks he can outplay him at his own game, does he? No matter. No one is better at being stoic then Draco himself.

"My allegiance belongs with the Dark Lord." Draco is stiff and unmoving, but somehow he feels twelve years old again, trying to tell the prefect holding him by the ear, that yes, Professor Snape gave him permission to be out, and of course he wasn't sneaking out to terrorize Neville Longbottom.

And then, Potter loses his cool; Draco feels a small sliver of satisfaction at how entirely awful Potter is at containing his emotions. "I don't believe that for one second. Malfoy, I saw you. You couldn't kill Dumbledore; you're not a killer. I know that you don't want this life for yourself— please. Please join us."

Draco doesn't know why, but he wants to say yes more than anything else in the world. It is an ache that starts in his chest and travels through his limbs until every ounce of his is fighting the urge. But he digs his nails into his palm and somehow says, "No." How did Potter know he couldn't kill Dumbledore? Draco finds the thought unsettling.

He cannot tell exactly how Potter feels, but he knows there's a mesh of emotions swirling inside him once more because he looks resigned and disappointed and something else Draco can't identify all at once.

And then Potter pulls the cloak back over his shoulders and turns so that he is staring directly at Draco. "Well, if you change your mind . . . "

"Do you think I'm just going to let you walk away from here? You're the Dark Lord's worst enemy, and you're on his property, and in case you've forgotten, I'm one of his followers." Draco isn't quite sure why the words spill from his lips, but he knows that he should listen to himself before he ends up being the next person on trial.

"Yes, I do," Potter says calmly. He is staring at Draco so intently, that Draco can't help but play with the lace lining his emerald cloak. "You may not know it, but you've got more Regulus Black in you then you think. Although you're not nearly as brave." Potter looks defensive now, and Draco feels the first bubblings of anger rising up in him.

"What do you know about Regulus Black?" he snaps suddenly, before realizing, stupidly, that Sirius Black was Potter's godfather, and of course he would have known about Regulus. He cannot figure what what Potter is trying to imply, though, and it irks him like a stain of pumpkin juice on a freshly ironed cloak.

"It doesn't matter; just please consider joining. We need you, we can protect you, and we can protect your whole family."

And then he feels the pain of the Dark Mark, searing and burning into his skin. All too aware of Potter standing beside him though, he simply grits his teeth and turns his head.

"I have to go. But I will find you again. This isn't over." Draco feels the power slipping through his fingers.

"Of course." Potter looks almost amused now. "The offer still stands if you meet anymore of us."

The mark burns again, and Draco can't hold back the surge of hatred that courses through him. He hates the way that Voldemort calls them, grown men and women, as though they are farm animals, their only purpose to do his bidding. And then he feels a kind of vindictive pleasure that Potter is back and out there and that he, Draco, let Potter go.

But Draco is not at all a Gryffindor (thank Merlin), and the thought of Voldemort angry, at him, brings sweat beading from the palms of his hands, so he turns quickly on the spot and Disapparates to the Dark Lord's office.

The office had once belonged to the minister, but it is the Dark Lord's now and so cluttered with dark magic—an enchanted skull on the desk, a pulsing sort of rope on the shelf, a deadly pair of paintings on the wall—that Draco feels almost claustrophobic.

"You know why we are here," the Dark Lord hisses, Nagini curled around his shoulders like some grotesque sort of scarf. Draco thinks of Fenrir and the vampire in the Department of Muggle Extermination and almost lets out a defeated sort of sigh, although the thought of no Fenrir is a pleasant one.

"Any word of Potter, my Lord?" The speaker is a a new recruit with long twisting dreadlocks and a cloak far too bright for this kind of time. It is clear she has not yet learned to hold her tongue. Draco gives her two weeks at most.

"No," Voldemort hisses. "But Potter can not hide for ever, and we will find him, or all of you will pay."

The meeting is long and depressing, full of petty power-plays and malevolent schemes, and Draco is glad to scurry back to his room—so glad that he almost knocks over his mirror.

The mirror in Draco's room is ornately carved with pearls placed in every crevice the carver could fit them in, but despite its grand appearance and the lap of luxury it's owner seems to live in, it has never once seen the pale-faced boy smile.

Tonight, is a different story though, and as moonlight reflects of the emeralds, spilling into the grandiosely decorated room, the boy smiles. It is not a happy smile, per say, but it is a hopeful one. Then the boy seems to part his lips in a barely noticeable whisper, and the ghost of a sentence comes out: "Potter is coming. They are still out there." The mirror can't tell if its imagined the words, but there is no mistaking the grin unfurling on the boy's fragile face.


End file.
